SAN ANTONIO — As much as the narrative of the Miami Heatles has centered on LeBron James, Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh from the start, the four-year journey this team is still on is not strictly about those stars.

Yes, they sacrificed individual glory to be a part of what has become a movement, of sorts, in Miami and beyond. But they are not the only ones. Every man on the Heat roster has had to make some sort of sacrifice to be here, and that’s not lost on any of them.

The same “Heatles” t-shirts worn by Wade and Bosh after the Heat’s shootaround Thursday morning were like the ones worn by Ray Allen, Mario Chalmers and James Jones.

The Big 3?

Sure.

But this Heat team is so much more than that, the connection goes so much deeper than that and the collective sacrifice is so much greater than it appears from the outside.

“This is just the continuation of our chemistry,” Jones said of the Heatles t-shirts and the energetic vibe surrounding the Heat as they head into Game 1 Thursday night against the San Antonio Spurs. “We came into this thing, basically, all committed to an ideal and goal of winning a championship. And that meant we had to sacrifice on a lot of fronts. And until you get a chance to know these guys … some people look at it financially, just the money [sacrificed] or the opportunity to win a championship. But for each guy, those ideals are different. So for each guy, as you get to know them better, you get a chance to help each other cope with those sacrifices. Because it’s not easy. And the better we can help each other manage it, the better our team becomes.”

For the role players, the sacrifice is more about playing time and prominence. A role player, a veteran shooter, like Jones might log major minutes depending on a matchup. Or he might not see the floor, for the exact same reason. Either way, he has to be ready on a Heat team where coach Erik Spoelstra will not hesitate to go outside of the box to get the desired results.

It’s an approach I’ve dubbed #ByAnyMeansNecessary, and one that Spoelstra and Spurs coach Gregg Popovich have utilized to the fullest last season when they led their teams to The Finals and again throughout this postseason to deliver us all the rematch.

It’s all born out of the same place, though, for the Heat and the Spurs … the collective sacrifice. No matter how you come together (be it for four years or 12), to reach this point in a season takes the ultimate sacrifice on the part of so many.

“Until you’re a champion no one can ever really imagine how difficult it is to get here [four years in a row or two straight year],” said Jones, who has been on the Heat roster longer than anyone except for Wade, Udonis Haslem and as long as Chalmers, who said, “It’s not all physical and it’s not all mental. It’s a mix. And when you throw expectations, your own expectations, on top of that, it’s a heavy load. And the champions find a way to manage that and overcome it.”

3 Comments

Dude be realistic, I’m a Heat fan and I know that won’t happen, you don’t even sound like a real Heat fan if you think the Heat can beat this team 4 in a row for a sweep, it shows me you don’t watch basketball much.